Oh man... AquaWorld... caution

[IchiroBoston]

I originally posed here in the Mexico forum because I did not know the Incident forum existed. It as not my intention to double post.
That is why I have not really participated in this thread.

Please check the other thread. Im actually annoyed at people saying "why did you not investigate AquaWorld...etc" I am NEW to this sport, but I know now what to look for and what not to look for.

What pisses me off about this whole ordeal was AquaWorld gave my friends a very bad and dangerous 1st dive. I have no problem taking responsibility of my gear but for AquaWorld to treat 1st divers (resort divers) they way they did was just crazy. Like I said before, when I dove with them the year before it was totally different. All clean gear, the crew and instructors were amazing. I have no idea what happened in the past year.

 

[Rafael]

Well one of the things that happened to Aquaworld is that after the hurricane they fired lots of people.

 

[mikerault]

I posted the data to Aquaworld, they responded:

Dear Mike,



Hello! My name is Dahymaru and I work with Jenny, she is not available at the moment. I was reviewing this comment and I find some inconsistences:



For the dive on May 3rd, this person should be referring to our 1 tank dive trip which is rarely taken by a certified diver because of the shallow profile. Anyways, I tried to find a reservation in our system from a certified diver taking this trip and later on, the Cozumel trip on the mentioned dates and I did not find any.



For the dive trip on May 6th. This dive is supposed to have been in Cozumel, I need to explain you that we divide the divers into begginers (not certified and people in process of getting certified) and certified divers and they board different boats. I'd also like to add that the manager of our Cozumel location is very strict in this sense, no begginer would board the boat with certified divers, not even a certified diver if s/he does not bring the C-Card.



Some of the reefs that we visit in our Cozumel diving trips are the following: Paradise reef, Chancanaab reef, Tormentos, Tunich reef, San Francisco Wall, Santa Rosa Wall, Paso del Cedral reef, Colombia reef, Palancar reef and Punta Sur reefs. We do not visit any "Las Palmas" reef.



Then, it says "Both my wife and I have done 7 tank dives with AquaWorld and will never deal with AquaWorld Because of the poor equipment supplied to us". In my personal opinion, I would not risk to even perform 2 dives with a company with which I had problems with the equipment from the very beggining.



We are a reputable company, we also provide the diving career course from Open Water to instructor level, then, we have to proceed following the PADI safety standards and I hope we can do business with you.



Please, do not hesitate in contacting me for any further assistance.



Best regards,



Dahymaru Azueta

This was posted with their permission to do so.

Mike

 

[IchiroBoston]

I heard that their "policy" is like that with certified divers on beginners boat. The AquaWorld people taking reservations and even the guy on the dock (at Playa) knew some of us were fully certified. They even signed our dive log books! I did not know of this policy.... during the reservation I told the guy that we have a few 1st timers, a few repeat resort divers and 4 certified divers. He said "no problem, you can all go on the beginners boat". He even gave us certified divers a discount!

Im sure AquaWorlds "Policies" are good, maybe they should make sure their crew follow them.

Also I am not here to slam AquaWorld for no reason. Im just tell this forum what happend to me.

I started this thread by accident, I had no idea there was a "accident" section.
If you can, please just follow the accident thread.

http://www.scubaboard.com/showthread.php?t=142614

Mike: Thanks for getting that info to AquaWorld. I was hoping there was some other way to get in touch with them. I tried calling and e-mailing them.

 

[fisherdvm]

I dove with Aquaworld for 1 two tank night dive in Nov 2005, before the bad hurricane.
This is my experience:

1. The regulator mouthpiece was torn, and I noted it on initial testing. They promptly changed it - but it should have been caught before being passed out.

2. The rented equipment has no snorkel. Waves were about 3 to 4 foot high, as hurricane Rita (I believe) was hitting the carribean. They said - "snorkels are not needed, as they come loose in the waves anyway!".

3. Only one primary light was passed out. No secondary back up was issued. Despite the fact that there were only 5 of us divers on the boat, and only 4 dived (one got sea sick from the waves). They had plenty of extra lights, but issued only 1. If your light went out, you are dead meat in the dark night and very large ocean. Their advise to me - "swim toward the lights of isla mujeres, cause if you missed isla mujeres, you'd be lucky to be found!".

4. Dive masters were too interested in waking up sleeping nurse sharks and taking video to sell, they never kept track of their few (4) divers. When my air got low, I notified one of the 2 divemasters of my reading, and went up. I later was chewed up by the other divemaster for not staying with the group. Unfortunately, I was a lone diver, and was matched with one of the divemaster. He had no idea where I was 98% of the time, and I was aware of where he was 100% of the time.

5. The life vests were carefully packed in a box above the dive boat, and not easily accessible. This really came into play when we returned and narrowly missed some ragged rocks - they were trying to save time by going through some very tight passage at the light house. They were sweating, just like I was.

My gather with aqua world : 1. If you are diving with them at night - bring along at minimum, a beacon or a small back up light - as they will not issue you two light as you should have. 2. Bring along an inexpensive snorkel to use with their issued mask - unless you trust that your BC will hold up, and you are a good swimmer. The waves can be nasty. Fortunately, I had my own prescription goggles and snorkel. The other divers had to suffer without a snorkel.

As their dive operation is located south, they do have to go through some dangerous passage by the light house. My recommendation for the management is that they don't take risky path, especially in large waves at night. Rumors had it that Aquaworld lost a divemaster by accidently backing up over him. Based on what I saw on my 1 boat dive - I would not be surprised. My experience with the another smaller dive operator in cancun (located in the isla mujeres side) was excellent in safety - their three dive masters constantly checked our air, and made decisions to go up, as soon as one diver had low air.... I felt safe with the 4 dives I did with them, even as a lone diver.

 

[mikerault]

And I have to give AquaWorld some negative feedback, my son-in-laws primary stage on his regulator gave out at 20 feet down and stopped giving air, even though his SPG (submergible pressure guage) indicated he had 500 PSI in his tank. This wouldn’t have been a real problem if the dive masters assistant had been where he should have been to provide a spare air (octo) but instead my son-in-law was basically by himself , luckily we were only in 20 feet of water at the time and he had just exhaled out all his breath, he basically did a free ascent to the surface, but I don’t think he remembered to try to blow out all the way up. Had he not just done a complete exhale, or got a partial breath instead of none, he might have severely injured himself from a lung over-expansion injury. Usually first (or primary) stage failure, especially of this type, is due to allowing saltwater to get into the first stage causing the corrosion of the components and possible buildup of salt crystals which can jam air pathways in the internals of the regulator. Once on the surface the regulator breathed OK and the tank indicate 1000 PSI indicating that it was probably some sort of blockage of the intake port. My son-in-law also experienced dump valve failure on his rented BCD on his second dive, another failure that shows lack of proper equipment maintenance. Since he was only in 20-30 feet of water, again, it wasn’t a big issue, but had he been a more experienced, certified diver and the problem occurred at 80 or 90 feet down, it may have resulted in an uncontrolled ascent and possible DCS (decompression sickness) hit.

These types of problems are why I am a strong supporter of owning at least your own regulator and BCD where you know the stuff is maintained properly.

I watched the divemaster on one of my dives take my BCD/regulator assembly from the expended tank and place it on the full tank for my second dive. I went over to record the pressure for my log and when I turned on the tank valve, could hear the distinct hiss of a air leak through the o-ring seal of the tank, when he did the pressure check he appearently hadn’t heard it. I pointed this out and he removed my rig to replace the o-ring on the tank valve. While he went to get a new o-ring, he just left my regulator lying where it was in a splash area from the forward motion of the boat through the waves, with the dust cap off. The dust cap keeps dust and debris, as well as water, from entering the first stage. I went over and replaced the dust cap on the regulator myself. On another dive where I had let them rig the second tank, they had neglected to remove the masking tape they used to cover the tank valve opening and had just put my rig over the top of it, why it didn’t leak like a sieve I don’t know, if they did this all the time, it could also explain the failure of my son-in-laws regulator as sections of the masking tape would plug up the filter on the intake port.

So, if you dive with Aquaworld, take your own gear and check if they do the tank switches for you.

Mike

 

[scubawife]

Mike, I have to ask why your son-in-law didn't switch to his octo if the primary was not working and he still had air in the tank? Or why didn't you offer your octo? At that point I'd have still called the dive but at least you would be making a safer ascent.

Why do you feel it would be the assistant DM or even the DM's responsibility to offer air if a primary fails? (Was your SIL doing a discover scuba dive or is he a certified diver?) First the diver should go to his own octo, then if that also failed, the buddy should be at arms length to offer their octo and safely ascend together.

I have never dived with Aquaworld or in Cancun and I don't have any plans to. Just curious about the way you chose to handle the situation with the unresponsive 2nd stage.

 

[mikerault]

Like I said, I was slightly ahead of him and was taking a picture behind a coral head when the situation occured, it only took about 10 seconds, this was only his second dive ever and he was under a resort cert card (discover scuba) so was the responsibility of the DM/instructor. When I moved slightly ahead to take the picture the dive masters assistant who was supposed to be in the rear of the group (and was when I went ahead to take the picture) moved ahead of him and left him. Note that the gage read 500 psi, then 1000 psi on the surface and no air came from the reg even when he purged it. Sounds like the main intake was plugged temporarily so even the octo would not have helped.

He paniced as soon as he couldn't purge the reg and shot for the surface, if he would have thought he could have tried the octo, but it was only his second dive ever after a resort course.

Yes, I should have stayed by his side, but when I left him he was with the assistant. I didn't get a chance to handle it but would have gladly handed him my primary and used my spare (it is on my BCD fill so I hand over the primary instead of an octo). I am still sure even switching to his octo wouldn't help as it appeared to have been a primary, not a secondary stage problem. Secondaries usually fail open as a safety feature, they don't just stop. Combined with the wildly differing pressure reads it adds up to a faulty primary. The DM was responsible for him as he was under a resort certification and actually looked miffed if I crouded in, after all he was responsible for the resort certs with the group.

Mike

 

[Cacia]

Although I think it is bad to trash operators, when equipment is a old and failing, not one or two things, but LOTS of it...which is coming across here, those complaints should not be muzzled. This is different from all the subjective whines people have, how you were treated, etc, because equipment failure is very serious. It happens to the best operators but seriously, rental equipment should be replaced every year if it is getting used hard on daily charters. If equipment looks really old...that is not a good sign. I am not a person who will NOT use a rental...but I won't use equipment that looks thrashed. That type of information, IMV is exactly the type of information appropriated to share on SB forum.

They have the right to not spend money on new gear every year, just as divers have the right to tell other divers that they are using old crappy gear.

Honestly, if you are doing night dives, you should have your own gear in most cases. Rental gear should be for easy breezy dives for beginners who are trying to see if they like diving, in general.

 

[dlndavid]

I asked Cancun Mark who used to teach for Aquaworld, who to get my OW certification from, he recommended two other OPs.